'Climb For Change' Lets You Crowdfund Your Excursion

Climb for Change is an online fundraising platform for charity climbs, treks, hikes and adventures that was recently launched by Mike and Chantal Schauch in Vancouver, Canada.

Imagine taking on the epic challenge of climbing a mountain like Kilimanjaro or Everest, and now factor in that you'll be doing it to raise funds for charity. Along with a vigorous training and nutrition program, you'll have to devote a lot of time and effort to fundraising.

For some, this fundraising piece is the most exhausting and intimidating part. Picture yourself setting the goal to raise $150,000. Would you ask your friends and family to donate? Who else would you ask? How would you ask them? How much could you raise?

Mike and Chantal know firsthand how difficult it can be to fundraise for charity climbs, which is why they were inspired to create Climb for Change. The husband and wife team has done many charity climbs, including Mt. Kilimanjaro in 2010, and La Malinche and Pico de Orizaba in Mexico in 2011.

Combine this experience and passion for climbing with Chantal's background in social innovation and marketing, and Mike's background in finance, and you have the perfect mix to launch an innovative, adventure-based crowdfunding platform.

“While there are literally thousands of people climbing for charity each year, there was, until now, no online hub where people could come together to share stories, resources and tips on what they were doing, and there was no fundraising campaign platform focused specifically on this type of market,” Chantal told Axiom News.

“We realized that there are people out there who need help,” she says. “They want to do an adventure — they want to do it for a cause — but they need help to get started and they need help with the fundraising.”

Climb for Change, which launched in late 2012, allows anyone to sign up for free to run their own campaign to fundraise for a charity climb. After sign up, the climber is given their own customizable website and the tools to fundraise for a registered charity of their choice in Canada, the USA or the UK.

From there, the climber just has to promote their campaign page to their network, and start hitting the gym!